Seeing red about red-light cameras

No doubt the San Diego Police Department is proud that half the tickets generated by red-light cameras in the city come from one intersection – Harbor Drive at Grape Street (“Our San Diego, June 13). But maybe, just maybe, San Diego's finest may want to ask and question why one intersection – no matter how good for the city's coffers – would have such a high incidence of so called “red-light” runners.

Maybe that highly congested intersection, where tourists, airport shuttle buses, vehicles with boats attached, limousines and taxis racing to or from Lindbergh, line up for the traffic lights and, in the process of trying to avoid encounters of various kinds, simply get caught in the intersection, too late to avoid the flash of the cameras. Most of the drivers are not trying to break the law, I suspect, but become victims of bad circumstances.

The article provokes the question: are the photo-controlled traffic lights really getting the red-beaters, or are they more often than not catching people who do not intend to run the lights but get caught because of conditions beyond their control? The cameras don't allow for situations created by sudden backups and other kinds of influences. How about my friend who followed a semi-into a busy intersection, both on green. The truck driver, moving very slowly, made it. My friend did not. She got the big one and traffic school.

Putting cameras in two intersections, one after the other, appears to be happening in San Diego. That doesn't give the average sucker an even break or brake. The planners apparently deduced that if we don't get the citizen on the first light, we will surely get him or her on the second.

These comments are no doubt wasted on the powers-that-be who mainly see the photo lights as badly needed money-makers. And I have no doubt that drivers will be overwhelmed by them as time goes on. But I do hope the “deciders” use a little more common sense in the logistical parameters of placement of the electronic traffic cops. Most of us really don't want to be criminals.

WILLIAM A. HARPER San Diego

Alternative energy should include nuclear

Congress has pursued a strategy of taxing fossil fuels in order to discourage their consumption and has heavily subsidized alternative energy sources such as wind and solar. This strategy ignores an inconvenient truth – renewable energy cannot meet the nation's everyday power demands.

Often, however, the most efficient and proven source of carbon-free energy – nuclear power – has been the conspicuously missing link in the climate debate. This month, as the ranking member of the House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform, I have co-sponsored the American Energy Act. It would establish a national goal of licensing 100 new nuclear reactors over the next 20 years by streamlining a burdensome regulatory process and ensuring safe storage and recycling of spent nuclear fuel.

In 2008, the 104 nuclear reactors operating in the United States produced more than 800 billion kilowatt-hours, equal to 19 percent of our total electricity output and representing nearly 75 percent of U.S. carbon-free electricity.

For 30 years, economic and social constraints sidelined the development of nuclear power in the United States. Today, social and economic shifts have placed the nuclear industry on the cusp of a renaissance. The Nuclear Regulatory Commission is reviewing applications for 26 new reactors that would provide 34,000 more megawatts of electricity. Even as our economy struggles, nuclear energy has created almost 15,000 jobs in the last three years.

Regrettably, clean nuclear energy continues to stir fears that harken to earlier times of environmental suspicion and political bias. In more than 50 years of operation, however, not a single American has lost his or her life as a result of commercial nuclear power.

Regrettably, America still lags behind other nations that are already producing safe, clean nuclear technologies and developing new methods to secure and reprocess nuclear waste. Still in its infancy, nuclear power is nonetheless a titan in the energy world.

Punish with compassion in high school case

I don't know Elphbert Laforteza, accused in the bottle bomb explosions at San Ysidro High School. But I've watched with sadness the events surrounding the very foolish and dangerous actions.

Laforteza's arraignment does raise questions: Could an intelligent young man be so lacking in common sense; could he have made what he thought was an inconsequential decision which has now changed the course of his life?

Unfortunately, so many young people do not carefully think out such decisions.

I do not sense any maliciousness here. I do believe that the perpetrator, if convicted, should be punished. But prison is not the answer in this case. I think the public's interest would be far better served by placing the individual on probation for a time and requiring two or three years of going and speaking to high school students about decision-making and actions.

Who better to explain to students that what seem like simple and inconsequential decisions can have lasting consequences and change or damage one's life forever?

In prosecuting the case, I urge the district attorney to seek a sentence that is just, carries punishment and also serves the public best.

BRYAN FELBER Chula Vista

Guard tower shipment finally reaches Mexico

On June 14 the Union-Tribune ran an article on local lifeguard efforts to donate 16 retired lifeguard towers to Baja California agencies. Sandra Dibble's piece did an excellent job of highlighting the problems we encountered securing an import permit from Mexican Customs officials. The import permit has been issued and the towers have been transported to lifeguard agencies in Tijuana, Rosarito, and Ensenada.

Days after the original article appeared, the U-T published “Lifeguard tower solution” in the Letters section. I would like to thank the author of the letter for the support but I could not disagree more regarding the bribe allegation. The donation team was never asked for, nor encouraged to pay a bribe in order to resolve the “paperwork problems.” The import permit was obtained thanks to the hard work of donation team members in partnership with Tijuana officials.

The permit was issued, the towers have been transported, and soon they will be helping save lives.

AARON QUINTANAR Lifeguard Tower Donation Director San Diego

RAND clarifies preschool study

I wanted to correct a couple of mistaken impressions created by Chester Finn's commentary June 13 that cited our latest RAND Corp. study about preschool services in California.

First, the RAND study does not address whether universal preschool is a valuable approach for California. Our study does indicate that there are strong arguments for making preschool available only for more disadvantaged children and other good reasons to support making preschool available to all. But each approach also has its drawbacks, so ultimately the public and elected officials must weigh the trade-offs.

Second, while Finn suggested our study was linked to a 2006 ballot initiative that would have created a universal preschool system in California, our work was requested by state policy-makers. Funding was provided by a consortium of foundations and preschool providers.

Evidence shows that preschool can play an important role in improving school readiness and closing academic achievement gaps in California. The better we understand the facts, the better we can plan for the future.

LYNN A. KAROLY Senior economist RAND Corporation Santa Monica

Another setback for hapless Republicans

No one likes to kick a party when it's down, but how much more bad news does the GOP need? The party loses the White House. It loses Congress. And it can't get anybody but white folks to vote for its candidates. And now the Republican Party gets an old-fashioned scandal when it least needs one.

Conservative, self-proclaimed family-values advocate Sen. John Ensign, R-Nevada, has admitted that he had an extra-marital affair with the wife of one of his staffers last year. Aren't they always the ones? The ones who decry the deterioration of our values by others. But then you learn they are the ones doing the messing around. Amazing.

How many of these holier-than-thou hypocrites are going to realize that they are the ones who are decaying our moral fabric? They have looked at the enemy, and it is them. Sen. Larry Craig, R-Idaho, comes to mind. He railed for years about how the homosexuals were evil and unnatural, yet he was found soliciting a tryst in a men's room in a bathroom in Minnesota.

Whenever we hear people denounce others' lifestyles, perhaps we should investigate their private lives. Could they be attempting to deflect attention from their own sins and weaknesses?

As an aspiring presidential candidate, the handsome senator from Nevada probably not only ruined his own chances of that goal, but also adds to the list of Republicans who continue to shoot themselves in the foot. The party of family values and the moral majority, apparently is anything but.

NINA MORRILL Escondido

DNA testing and the Supreme Court

The latest Supreme Court ruling, that DNA testing for convicts is not a right granted by the Constitution is perplexing. The story indicates the justices voted along traditional liberal/conservative lines. Yet, I don't know anyone liberal or conservative whot would deny an individual a test that could conclusively confirm their innocence or guilt. That is, unless they are accused of being a suspected terrorist.

I assume that this decision is based on this right not being spelled out in the Constitution. If that is correct, then damn those founding fathers for not being prescient enough to include every possible future development.

Who could possibly applaud this decision? One, strict constitutionalists, if it's not in there, it can't be implied. Two, a subset of all law enforcement officials, those who are more concerned about their conviction percentages, rather than pesky details of guilt or innocence. And three, those people who feel everyone is guilty of something, except, of course themselves and other like-minded people, and if you were convicted you probably had it coming. It seems to me that when abstract notions of law trample basic common sense, no one is being well served.

GLENN SPANGLER San Diego

Columnist Willand his two faces

In response to “A need for more judicial activism” (Opinion, June 14):

Oh, George Will of the Washington Post, where were you when the Executive Branch governed by dictate and trampled on many personal constitutional rights, e.g., habeas corpus, in a misguided attempt to fight terrorism by suspending all rights of citizens?

Now that the current executive is simply continuing to exercise powers over businesses initiated by the George Bush administration, Will believes those powers infringe on the “constitutional” rights of lenders, investors and businesses. Will at his conservative best is now inciting his conservative buddies to “rethink” judicial activism.

“Judicial activism” is code by conservatives to attack judges, almost always liberal, who might attempt to interpret constitutional law so it more equitably applies to problems and peoples in this century not anticipated by the great writers of our constitution. Suddenly, the rights of failing businesses and their secured creditors are being usurped as part of President Obama's attempt to recover from a recession in part by using powers against business initiated by George Bush in his 12-hour attempt to combat the recession.

Oh, George Will, where was your proud, loud voice when individuals were losing their rights?